The Chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs highlighted broad support for the Veterans Appeals Improvement and Modernization Act of 2017, bipartisan legislation to overhaul the outdated benefits claims appeals process at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). The VAs appeals process is in significant need of updating. Nearly half a million veterans are in limbo because of the VAs existing appeals backlog. The bill is supported by VA Secretary David Shulkin and has also won the support of veterans groups that represent millions …

Disabled American Veterans, Paralyzed Veterans of America and Veterans of Foreign Wars have responded to the Administration’s proposed budget for the delivery of health care for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in Fiscal Years 2018-19.

Read the VA’s overview of the proposed budget: ( http://bit.ly/2qpgOSe ) and the assessment of it by the veterans groups: ( http://bit.ly/2qhTuL8 ).

Veterans unhappy with their benefits payouts have a five-year average wait today if they appeal the decision. House of Representatives lawmakers are hopeful that soon they can take years off that wait. Members of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee have debated draft legislation that would radically overhaul the Veterans Affairs (VA) benefits appeals process. Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) and other vet service organizations have addressed the Committee showing strong support for the legislation.

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) recently announced the launch of the Center for Compassionate Innovation (CCI), which will explore emerging therapies that may enhance Veterans’ physical and mental well-being. CCI’s mission is to find innovative approaches to health care, which may support those Veterans who are unsuccessful with conventional treatment.

For many Veterans, deciding when, where and how to receive medical care is often one of the most complex and challenging decisions of the health care process. Health care performance, access or quality of care data, is very complicated – leaving many Veterans at a loss for the best course of action. To help, VA is launching a new website with an access and quality tool to help Veterans make more informed choices.

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) will decide roughly around mid-summer which type of electronic health record (EHR) it’s going to use. VA Secretary David Shulkin recently said that the VA has made great strides with its information technology, and is in fact considered a leader in some areas of healthcare. But the VA needs to do better at sharing veterans’ medical records between both the VA physicians and private physicians who are also treating them, said a former VA Under Secretary for Health.

Lawmakers are asking Veterans Affairs to extend health care enrollment deadlines for more than 440,000 veterans who may have had their applications rejected because of coding errors made by the bureaucracy. They are asking VA Secretary Shulkin to extend deadlines for another year, to ensure the veterans will not have to restart the whole process.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims has rejected a motion from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) that it be allowed to stop reimbursing hundreds of thousands of veterans for non-VA emergency care costs they have paid until higher courts rule on VA’s appeal. The joint executive director of the National Veterans Legal Services Program said the court was right to reject VA’s request because its chances of winning on appeal are low, and more delay in paying claims would cause irreparable harm …

The demographics of U.S. Veterans are set to change dramatically. Currently, the majority of Veterans are male and white, with the largest group having served during the Vietnam War. However, by 2040, 20 percent of Veterans will be women and 34 percent will be nonwhite. VA is conducting research to help make sure these growing Veteran minority populations are receiving the same quality of care – medical care that is (1) safe, (2) effective, (3) patient-centered, (4) timely, (5) efficient, and (6) equitable.

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has amended its regulations regarding presumptive service connection, adding certain diseases associated with contaminants present in the base water supply at U.S. Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, from August 1, 1953, to December 31, 1987.